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Small side question; anybody else think Claus is getting worse recently? I mean, he's always been one to push for an argument, and I respect that, however his discussions are becoming more and more pointless as time goes on. This 'a leg is not a leg' thing, the alligator nonsense... I recently had a discussion on heroin in which his responses were, well, less than I'd expect from somebody who would explore the issue with a balanced view of the evidence.

I'm not asking this as an attack on the guy (I've always personally liked Claus), but rather it's only struck me recently just how bad his arguments are getting. Maybe he needs a holiday?

Claus posted:Claus, please give the name and publication details of the dictionary you were using to support the statement "all are allowed by the dictionary". Please also quote in full the entry or entries you were relying on.

Please explain how any answer to that question could have been used to illuminate the matter of whether or not the brille of a snake may be classified as eyelids.

Do we (that is us human beings, for the avoidance of doubt) refer to our eyelids as brille? If not, why not?

Claus may see this as trivial. However, he must realise that it's not the petty semantics that are the issue, but the matter of someone who chooses to hound and badger other posters for allegedly running away from questions they may not want to answer, running away himself and giving grounds for accusations of hypocrisy. The questions may be trivial, but they are not difficult.

Oh, and Claus, be advised that "I see. A leg is not a leg. Alice in Wonderland" and variations thereof is not an adequate response, and every repetition of such will be seen as adding further to the impression of evasion and hypocrisy.

Ah, those were the days!

Rolfe.

__________________"The way we vote will depend, ultimately, on whether we are persuaded to hope or to fear." - Aonghas MacNeacail, June 2012.

I have it on somewhat good authority that snakes can survive a long time at low temperature and in sealed bags, and at least in the experience of the guy who told me the story, have sometimes caused trouble that way. The guy was (and is) an exotic meat dealer and related that his company had recieved a shipment of rattlesnakes that turned out to be alive when they opened the bags. They tried to kill them by putting the bags in cold storage, and thought they'd succeeded, only to find out that not only did being in a sealed bag not kill rattlesnakes, putting them in the fridge just made them ACT dead until they warmed up. Apparently much fun was had by all. The fella who told me the story was a complete bastard, and ends up in the news now and then for being a complete bastard when it comes to ethical behavior in the meat industry, but I believe him; I heard the story a couple of times and he's been quite consistant. At one time he'd posted it on his company's website too, but I can't seem to find it. In any case, this one's plausible to me.

__________________"Everyone takes the limits of his own vision for the limits of the
world." - Arthur Schopenhauer

"New and stirring things are belittled because if they are not belittled,
the humiliating question arises, 'Why then are you not taking part in
them?' " - H. G. Wells

Snakes do not have eyelids, or nictitating membranes, or scales over their eyes.

They have a very thin layer of skin over their eyes, which peels off each time it sheds. It is often called an eyecap. You can see the eye cap coming off in one piece with the shed skin.
See link for a photo of a shed eyecap.

__________________"I dont call that evolution, I call that the survival of the fittest." - Bulletmaker
"I thought skeptics would usually point towards a hoax rather than a group being duped." - makaya325
Kit is not a skeptic. He is a former Bigfoot believer that changed his position to that of non believer.- Crowlogic

__________________May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. May your mountains rise into and above the clouds. - Edward Abbey

Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves. - John Muir

__________________"I dont call that evolution, I call that the survival of the fittest." - Bulletmaker
"I thought skeptics would usually point towards a hoax rather than a group being duped." - makaya325
Kit is not a skeptic. He is a former Bigfoot believer that changed his position to that of non believer.- Crowlogic

__________________"I dont call that evolution, I call that the survival of the fittest." - Bulletmaker
"I thought skeptics would usually point towards a hoax rather than a group being duped." - makaya325
Kit is not a skeptic. He is a former Bigfoot believer that changed his position to that of non believer.- Crowlogic

Yeah, I used to take frequent extended breaks, like 7-8 month long breaks, from the forum in large part because of him and a couple others. He seemed to develop a sort of odd vendetta against certain posters, most of whom were fellow skeptics, not woos, and constantly insisted he understood American culture and the American idiom better than any Americans because he lived here for a short time. Got real old, real fast.

__________________"All opinions are not equal. Some are a very great deal more robust, sophisticated and well supported in logic and argument than others." -- Douglas Adams
"The absence of evidence might indeed not be evidence of absence, but it's a pretty good start." -- PhantomWolf
"Let's see the buggers figure that one out." - John Lennon

__________________"I dont call that evolution, I call that the survival of the fittest." - Bulletmaker
"I thought skeptics would usually point towards a hoax rather than a group being duped." - makaya325
Kit is not a skeptic. He is a former Bigfoot believer that changed his position to that of non believer.- Crowlogic

__________________Me: So what you're saying is that, if the load carrying ability of the lower structure is reduced to the point where it can no longer support the load above it, it will collapse without a jolt, right?

Location: A pocket paradise between the sewage treatment plant and the railroad

Posts: 14,172

Back when this thread was recent forum memory, I did fine one single pop culture instance of a human leg being called (derogatorily) a drumstick.

It's in the Simpson's episode "Flaming Moe's" (season 3, episode 10), the one where Homer tells Moe the recipe for a drink he'd invented and Moe takes the credit and gets (temporarily) rich from it. The flashback back story of how Homer invented the drink begins:

HOMER (VOICE OVER): One night, Marge’s beastly sisters were showing slides from their latest vacation.
[SLIDE of...]
SELMA: ...And this is Patty trying to plug her leg razor into one of those ungodly Czechoslovakian outlets.
[SLIDE of one of the sisters in a lounge chair wearing a bathing suit, revealing very hairy legs]
SELMA: As you can see, we never did get the hang of it.
BART: Ay caramba!
HOMER (VOICE OVER): As I stared up at that hairy, yellow drumstick, I knew I needed a drink.

__________________Me: So what you're saying is that, if the load carrying ability of the lower structure is reduced to the point where it can no longer support the load above it, it will collapse without a jolt, right?

I had until now only heard of him, but just read some of the threads linked in this thread
All I can say is

WOW

I would have had CFL on ignore pretty much immediately, and what I found disturbing was that when I was reading the NDE thread, Steve was the calm one, he cited facts and figures, gave links, did everything 'by the book' whereas CFL was the rabid attack dog type, constantly misrepresented Steve's case, setting up strawmen and generally was abusive and his posts content free

And he was one of Randy's favourites?

__________________It's a kind of a strawman thing in that it's exactly a strawman thing. Loss Leader

'When you're born into this world, you're given a ticket to the freak show. If you're born in America you get a front row seat.' George Carlin

__________________"I dont call that evolution, I call that the survival of the fittest." - Bulletmaker
"I thought skeptics would usually point towards a hoax rather than a group being duped." - makaya325
Kit is not a skeptic. He is a former Bigfoot believer that changed his position to that of non believer.- Crowlogic

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